The present invention pertains to methods of making pants having front-to-back crotch seams. More particularly, the present invention pertains to methods of making boxer shorts having front-to-back crotch seams. The boxer shorts may be absorbent or non-absorbent.
Pant-like garments have numerous applications including disposable clothing, training pants, feminine care products, adult incontinence products, disposable swimwear, or the like. Pant-like disposable garments are typically three-dimensional products with closed sides so that the product has a unitary waist opening and two leg openings. The wearer raises and lowers the garment to apply the product. Three-dimensional, boxer shorts-like products are particularly appealing because the boxer shorts look more like conventional articles of clothes.
Many disposable pants are formed as composite structures in which several components are combined to form a product specifically suited to its intended purpose. For example, disposable pants often include one or more absorbent materials intended to absorb various bodily exudates such as urine, menstrual fluid, and/or sweat. Such products may include a liquid permeable bodyside liner and a liquid impermeable outer cover, and can include other materials and features such as elastic materials and containment structures.
However, many disposable pants can be aesthetically unappealing. Existing disposable absorbent pants can often be overly bulky and can often resemble disposable baby diapers. Various attempts have been made to provide disposable pants having an improved, more clothing-like appearance. However, disposable pants, particularly disposable absorbent boxer shorts, present many manufacturing challenges. In part, this is due to the high speed that is necessary to economically produce relatively low-cost disposable absorbent products. Product design can often be compromised by cost and manufacturing constraints, resulting in disposable pants that lack aesthetic appeal and product function.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,293,936 issued Sep. 25, 2001 to Otsubo and assigned to Uni-Charm Corporation, and European Patent Application Nos. EP 1 048 231 and 1 108 372 by Uni-Charm Co. Limited describe boxer shorts. However, these Uni-Charm references do not disclose making boxer shorts from a flat web. Instead, multiple web pieces are seamed together resulting in a three-dimensional garment that may be difficult to handle at the speeds of modem manufacturing equipment.
Thus, what is lacking and needed in the art are garment-like, aesthetically appealing boxer shorts, as well as methods of efficiently manufacturing such boxer shorts.